


hold on to hope to have you back again

by theyhadcookies



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Fix-It, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-12 18:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19234732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theyhadcookies/pseuds/theyhadcookies
Summary: "There is no reality where I wouldn’t come back to you.”Steve, captured in moments throughout Endgame.





	hold on to hope to have you back again

**Author's Note:**

> A very belated Endgame fix it to soothe my aching heart. Beta'd by Emily & Gonzu. 
> 
> Title from The Killers' "Here With Me."

Thanos is dead and the stones are gone.

Steve can’t breathe. He _can’t breathe._

*

When they return from The Garden, he moves out of the compound but stays close. Natasha is staying behind to run command — a one woman world security council while he tries to pick up where Sam left off at the VA. The compound hasn’t been home in a long time but he can’t just leave her in the wind. She’s lost family and has no walls left to hide behind. Steve’s already lost the love of his life and his best friend. Steve can’t afford to lose any more family than he already has.

Breakfast is the one meal they can reliably make between the two of them. Natasha makes sandwiches and coffee. Steve’s just about perfected bacon.

It becomes their tradition. Breakfast first thing, together. They can take on the world after breakfast.

After, when there’s a moment, they hold each other close. Natasha takes his face in her tiny, deadly, gentle hands; he presses his forehead to hers and they just breathe.

He tells her he loves her every day. He wasn’t able to tell Bucky when he had the chance. He didn’t get to tell Sam how much his friendship means to to him. It’s been five years since the snap, but Steve knows you can’t take anything for granted.

* 

It turns out, Scott Lang wasn’t dusted after all.

Time travel exists. And now,  they have a plan.

Bruce says you can’t change the past, but as he feels his old self’s arms wrap around his neck, the same chokehold he had on Bucky on the helicarrier, he can’t help but think, _maybe I can get it right this time. Maybe one of us can get him back._  

“Bucky. Is. Alive,” he bites out.

He hopes this future is better for them. He hopes this Steve can be brave.

*

They all almost make it. But Nat is gone. 

*

Steve’s hands are shaking and his whole body feels like one giant bruise. But Thor is down and Tony is down and he hasn’t heard anyone else on the comms. It’s just him now. 

He gets up and pulls the straps of the shield tight.

“Hey, Cap. It’s Sam.” Steve looks across Thanos’ army.

“On your left.”

*

Thanos is gone for good this time, thanks to Tony. Steve turns away from where Pepper, Rhodey and the Parker kid are standing and doesn’t so much look for Bucky as much as bowls over everyone until he finds him. He eventually finds Bucky near the remains of the Avengers compound, perched on rubble and scanning the crowd.

Steve _runs_.

Bucky sees him just as he approaches the wreckage and barely has time to react before Steve throws himself into Bucky’s arms. He can almost hear Sam roll his eyes and say, “Jesus, Rogers, you’re so damn extra.” He doesn’t care.

Bucky’s _back_ and Steve can feel his ribs ache at the strength of Bucky’s arms around him. Can feel the rabbit beat of Bucky’s heart against his chest. He clasps a trembling hand to the back of Bucky’s neck.

“Hey, Steve,” Bucky says softly into his ear. Steve lets out a sob and the tears come unbidden.

He supposes he was due for a long cry.

*

Bucky brings it up with Steve the night before he’s set to return the stones. 

“You could stay there, you know.” Bucky’s smoothing down the blankets on his side of the bed, eyes down and holding himself tightly. They’ve been bunking together since getting back to New York. Steve isn’t sure he can manage more than a few hours apart from Bucky.

“Stay where?” Steve asks.

“When you return the stones. You could stay in the past.” Bucky shrugs. He still won’t meet Steve’s eyes. “You can go home.”

“Bucky,” he manages to choke out, before scrambling across the bed to get to him. He grabs Bucky by the arms trying to get words out. Steve’s just gotten Bucky back. He’s not going anywhere.  He wants to say that Bucky is home. _Bucky_ is Steve’s _home._  

“I fought myself in 2012,” he blurts out instead. Bucky looks up at him, startled.

“What?”

“I fought myself, when we were trying to get the stones.” Steve takes a breath. “He fought better than me and I told him you were alive and he stopped fighting.

Bruce said I can’t change the past so I changed that Steve’s future instead. I hoped he would find you sooner that I did..

I could change it in the 70s too. I’ll probably still be too deep in the ice but they can find you.”  He grabs Bucky’s hand and holds tight. Bucky is looking at him with wide eyes. He’s been afraid, Steve realizes. Bucky’s been worried this whole time that Steve would leave and now, Steve finally has the words.

“Bucky, there is no reality where I wouldn’t come back to you.”

Bucky surges up to kiss him then. His hands are pressed to Steve’s cheeks and his lips are soft, chapped and this makes sense. _This_ was inevitable.

*

He starts with the space stone because he promised he would come home. Best not to borrow trouble, he reasons, even as he steals into Peggy’s office for one last glance.

She’s just there behind the glass and she is radiant. He misses her so goddamn much.

Her voice is clear in his head. _The world has changed and none of us can go back. All we can do is our best. And sometimes the best that we can do is to start over._

He doesn’t think she means it quite like this.

She was right. She’s lived a life. He has no right to take that from her.

And Bucky is waiting for him.  So he leaves a note and his compass instead.

*

Finding his way to Vormir is a pain in the ass. Getting Natasha back is a shot in the dark but he has to try.

Somehow, he does it.

“About that minute,” he says when she comes to. She groans as she accepts the hand he offers her.

“I was dead, Rogers. I’m allowed more than a minute.” He holds her tight.

“Missed you,” he whispers. 

“Missed you, too.”

*

Steve  lands on the platform, Natasha by his side and he feels giddy with a mission done right. Bucky is standing right where Steve left him, beaming, and he’s overcome with the urge to kiss and hold.

He hops of the platform, strides right up to Bucky, and in a moment of uncharacteristic madness, dips him to plant one right on him. It takes a moment to catch up, but Bucky threads one hand through Steve’s hair and kisses right back.

The war is over and Steve is finally home.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr at [dearmonday](http://dearmonday.tumblr.com)


End file.
